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What we lost the last time code got cheap

poppastring.com

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Re: What we lost the last time code got cheap

#91

Post by sanderjd »

kadhirvelm wrote: post #13

Curious what other teams are doing to keep encouraging people to think critically about their code? I’ve been finding it harder to keep people motivated, keep them engaged with all the changes coming in. And I can’t blame them, it’s been overwhelming. Is everyone else just using more AI..?

Yeah this is a good call out. What I've been doing so far is just hoping and praying that people naturally evolve their entire way of working without becoming demotivated or burned out. Seems like a bad strategy.

Re: What we lost the last time code got cheap

#92

Post by xienze »

stetrain wrote: post #68
xienze wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Like clockwork, every single thread about something AI-related has someone expressing their disgust at passages of LLM-written text. In many cases by the same people who are enthusiastically embracing LLM-generated software. Why don't we show the same level of contempt for LLM-authored software as we do for even the slightest hint of LLM-authored text in a blog post?

We don't like LLMs throwing giant walls of code in PRs at repos and expecting devs to read and respond to all of them. That's kind of similar to written content being posted and linked. There's an expectation that you are asking someone to take time to read it, and with LLMs now the cost to generate things to be read is a lot lower but our attention and capacity to read them remains the same.

> We don't like LLMs throwing giant walls of code in PRs at repos and expecting devs to read and respond to all of them.

One giant PR versus dozens of smaller ones, what's the difference? LLMs are going to send it your way whether you like it or not. No one is going to argue that usage of LLMs is going to lead to less code that has to be reviewed than normal, are they? It's by design since you're able to produce more code now, remember?

> There's an expectation that you are asking someone to take time to read it, and with LLMs now the cost to generate things to be read is a lot lower but our attention and capacity to read them remains the same.

I could understand this argument if this had been a 500 word blog post expanded out to 50K words, but it's not. And who's to say the author didn't write most of it and just had an LLM do a little polishing?

Re: What we lost the last time code got cheap

#93

Post by sanderjd »

olsondv wrote: post #56

When I generate code with AI, I will read through each change as it makes them (babysitting). If I don’t understand it, then I ask for explanation right away. At least by the end I have a grasp on what each change does and the reasoning. Then, I can make a PR and highlight the same info for my reviewer and for longevity. Our codebase style is not to litter comments everywhere. We go back to the code review for detail…

Yeah I work in pretty small chunks and do a lot of iteration on each chunk.

This is harder when I'm reviewing other peoples' work. It has definitely gotten to the point where I spend more time reviewing than implementing and find it to be the much more difficult part of the job. Which honestly sucks.

Re: What we lost the last time code got cheap

#95

Post by sanderjd »

nabbed wrote: post #3

I worried this blog post was going to pivot into a marketing pitch for some product, but no, it just describes the issue where the AI tool that generates your code probably won't document its reasons for the choices it makes. That documentation problem exists in the pre-AI era too, except that the reasons might exist in the heads of your co-workers and could possibly be teased out. I know nothing about AI code genera…

But I don't relate to "it probably won't document its reasons"... I spend more time telling it that it has over-documented than under-documented.

It always wants to include the specific thing it is fixing in the API docs for methods it touches. No, this is not the place for a changelog of why this method is implemented the way it is! Describe the interface and the contract, these details are non sequiturs and they are a distraction.

Re: What we lost the last time code got cheap

#96

Post by sanderjd »

htx80nerd wrote: post #11

>The cost of producing code has collapsed. AI tools can generate functional, adequate, perfectly average code at a speed and cost that would have been unimaginable even five years ago. And like the outsourcing wave of the early 2000s, the economics are real and rational. Nobody is wrong for using these tools. The code they produce is often fine. It works. It passes tests. It might ship as-is. After using AI for month…

Weird, this isn't my experience at all (mostly writing Python lately). Granted, it usually doesn't implement things exactly the way I want them to be implemented, and I iterate a lot on that. But I think it's been like a year? at least six months, since the code didn't work on the first try.

Re: What we lost the last time code got cheap

#97

Post by csallen »

croemer wrote: post #21

Reads at least partially like LLM writing, for example: > When code production gets cheap, the cost doesn't disappear. It migrates. > It was true then. It is unavoidably true now.

> When code production gets cheap, the cost doesn't disappear. It migrates.

I'm surprised people aren't taking the time to edit this very specific kind of phrasing out of their writing. It's such a common AI tell now that, even when writing by hand, I'd just avoid it entirely.

Then again, I hated that LLMs co-opted the em-dash, and I refuse to stop using it, so I suppose I get it.

Re: What we lost the last time code got cheap

#98

Post by sanderjd »

simonw wrote: post #24
htx80nerd wrote: post #11

>The cost of producing code has collapsed. AI tools can generate functional, adequate, perfectly average code at a speed and cost that would have been unimaginable even five years ago. And like the outsourcing wave of the early 2000s, the economics are real and rational. Nobody is wrong for using these tools. The code they produce is often fine. It works. It passes tests. It might ship as-is. After using AI for month…

Have you tried the "use red/green TDD" trick? I believe that increases the chances of one-shot code working, though it's also possible that it did that against Opus 4.5 and isn't necessary against Opus 4.7 but I haven't spotted the difference yet.

Yeah this is the way. Thinking about how it will verify that it has done the right thing is the key. This been be set up at the AGENTS.md level.

Very simple things like: "Write tests and make sure they pass." "Run lint after each change." "Write API docs in XYZ format."

In my experience, they are very good at fixing things they've done wrong after discovering them during those kinds of steps.

Re: What we lost the last time code got cheap

#99

Post by teiferer »

croemer wrote: post #21

Reads at least partially like LLM writing, for example: > When code production gets cheap, the cost doesn't disappear. It migrates. > It was true then. It is unavoidably true now.

Really? Do we now suspect everybody who uses the most basic of stylistic elements of producing slop?

Pendulums always swing back and forth between extremes but oh boy did this one swing fast into witch hint territory.

Re: What we lost the last time code got cheap

#100

Post by teiferer »

csallen wrote: post #97
croemer wrote: post #21

Reads at least partially like LLM writing, for example: > When code production gets cheap, the cost doesn't disappear. It migrates. > It was true then. It is unavoidably true now.

> When code production gets cheap, the cost doesn't disappear. It migrates. I'm surprised people aren't taking the time to edit this very specific kind of phrasing out of their writing. It's such a common AI tell now that, even when writing by hand, I'd just avoid it entirely. Then again, I hated that LLMs co-opted the em-dash, and I refuse to stop using it, so I suppose I get it.

Why would they have to? Just to avoid being accused of using a slop machine? If that is the only criticism you have against LLM produced text, then there is no problem.

And I'm saying this as somebody who is strongly against LLM-generated content of this form.

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